George Russell warned against taking the lap times too seriously after Lewis Hamilton ended the first pre-season test fastest.
On the final day of the three-day stint in Barcelona, seven-time world champion Hamilton set his best time late on the final day, replacing Russell who had set the pace in the morning.
Red Bull duo Max Verstappen and Sergio Perez were headed by Hamilton and Russell.
Russell said thatLap time-wise, he doesn't think it's representative at all.
He said that McLaren and Ferrari were looking very strong.
Even though we are top of the timesheets, Russell wouldn't read too much into it.
We have some improvements to make, as we are not happy with the balance of the car and the limitations we have currently. We have a good idea of the direction we need to go in.
Hamilton was 0.095 seconds quicker than Russell on the same tyres, and only 3 seconds slower than that, and also faster than Russell, using tyres one grade harder, and therefore theoretically slower.
Perez was 0.418 seconds behind Hamilton on the same type of tyre, while Verstappen was 0.618 seconds off the pace on two grades harder than the man he beat to the title in Abu Dhabi.
It has been an interesting few days. It has not been the easiest running. We have had some challenges to overcome.
We would always want more laps, but I am happy with the 100 laps we had today.
Hamilton was asked if he had an idea where the team were in terms of competitiveness. We don't know where we are.
Verstappen was the fastest on the soft tire, but he was followed by Charles Leclerc on the same tire.
Lando was the fastest on the first day and was 11th on Friday.
It has been a good start. Mercedes and Red Bull are the teams we expect to be at the front when it matters.
I don't think we are in an amazing place. We are in a good place. The car worked well when we put it on the track.
The reliability of headline lap times in pre-season testing is questionable as indictors of true competitiveness can have a dramatic effect on performance.
The morning session of testing was cut short by leaks that meant they couldn't repair their cars in time to run again.
Pierre Gasly crashed the Alpha Tauri before lunch and the team were unable to repair it in time for Yuki Tsunoda to go out in the afternoon.
There was a strange high-frequency bouncing phenomenon on the straights that was affecting all the teams.
This is created by the new aerodynamic philosophy inherent in cars designed to new regulations that are aimed at closing up the field and making the racing more competitive and amount to the biggest technical change in 40 years.
The problem is caused by the air being disrupted above a certain speed on the straights.
The cars sink towards the track when the speed increases. The loss of down force is caused by the disrupted air flow as the ride-height reduces. The car jumps up and then, when the airflow reforms begin to sink back down, it is disrupted again at the same point.
Carlos Sainz, seventh fastest on the final day, said it didn't feel great.
We are doing 300 km/h and jumping 30-40mm up and down. It was annoying. Hopefully it's resolved and we don't need to live with it because it is on the limit.
You have to trust the engineers that it will keep getting better as we learn the ground-effect cars.
One minute 19.138 seconds was the time for Lewis Hamilton.
George Russell is in a Mercedes.
3Sergio Perez is a Red Bull athlete.
Max Verstappen is a Red Bull athlete.
5 Sebastian Vettel is from Germany.
Charles Leclerc is from Mon.
Carlos Sainz (Spa) is a driver.
Alex Albon is 1:20.318.
Nicholas Latifi (Can) Williams 1:20.699
10 Daniel Ricciardo (Aus) McLaren.
Lando Norris is a McLaren driver.
Fernando Alonso is in the Alpine.
13 Guanyu Zhou (Chi) Alfa Romeo.
Pierre Gasly is from Alpha Tauri.
15 Nikita Mazepin is from Russia.
The Alfa Romeo was driven by 16 Valtteri Bottas.
All other times are set on C3.
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